2019-11-14 Server Deadlock, HQ Spam

[Haxus]

Server Deadlock
Vooker helped by showing me a bug that caused a server deadlock. It happened when he used his ship to attack a pirate base.

This was an elusive bug to find. The read/write lock at the heart of the problem was getting unlocked one too many times when a ground-based gun tower fired its weapon. That caused its internal lock counter to roll over backward to a large positive number, since it is unsigned. After that, it was only a matter of time before someone tried to lock the lock for write...deadlock.

Thanks again to Vooker525 for making me observe this bug. It is fixed.

HQ Spam
It was reported that multiple military HQ buildings on a world is a nuisance due to the additional city names that are created.

This isn't a bug because there was no limit placed on the number of military HQ buildings.

That said, the consequence of placing lots of them is very annoying and it serves no useful purpose.

One HQ is enough because you have to destroy all other military buildings first, before the HQ. It doesn't matter what those other buildings are. Other HQs are not particularly useful and it is only confusing.

I changed the build rule for military HQ buildings. They can no longer be built on a world that already has a military HQ building.

Existing worlds with multiple HQ buildings were left unchanged. While a nuisance, the extra HQs do not cause problems.

Bounty Dates
It would be nice if the list of bounties showed the date they were placed.

Bounties now show their create date on the Bounties page of the Bio window and also in the Bounties section of the avatar's web page.

Bounty Links
It would be nice if the list of bounties on the avatar's web page made a link to the person who placed the bounty.

Bounties on the avatar page now link to the avatar who placed the bounty.

Also, the emperor name in the Empire section of the avatar page is now a link.

Skills Page
It was suggested that the Skills table be moved to its own page on the Bio window.

Done. Skills are now on a separate page of the Bio window.

Animal Slaughter
I started investigating the cause of the servers working so hard.

I found a problem that caused animals to spawn at farms and immediately die, over and over, constantly. This was creating a load and wasting resources. I think the problem is fixed, pending testing.

Server Deadlock
Trapped another server deadlock. This one was a building trying to find the altitude of the terrain on its site.

Deadlock was fixed.

[Deantwo]

HQ Spam
It was reported that multiple military HQ buildings on a world is a nuisance due to the additional city names that are created.

This isn't a bug because there was no limit placed on the number of military HQ buildings.

That said, the consequence of placing lots of them is very annoying and it serves no useful purpose.

One HQ is enough because you have to destroy all other military buildings first, before the HQ. It doesn't matter what those other buildings are. Other HQs are not particularly useful and it is only confusing.

I changed the build rule for military HQ buildings. They can no longer be built on a world that already has a military HQ building.

Before you could place any number of HQs all over the world without even constructing any of them and using no resources at all.
This helps a lot to limit that. It means that you need to actually construct a HQ before that they can place more military buildings all over the world.

Now we just need a solution to the extremely annoying underground buildings.
See: (Bug report) Underground Buildings Exploits

Skills Page
It was suggested that the Skills table be moved to its own page on the Bio window.

Done. Skills are now on a separate page of the Bio window.

Could maybe add tooltip to each "skill" and explain what increases it. Not a high priority, but would be nice.